Sockets in the Sky

Ms Paintbrush Caribou stood on the roof of Paintbrush Fortress, where four paintbrush towers rose like giant art tools stuck in the sky.

Below, Canvas Tundra City blinked with billboard lights and snowy traffic lanes.

Her phone chimed.

“Checklist,” she said, tapping. “Tower bolts. Sky-bridge clips. Alarm lights.”

A boy jogged up the roof stairs, puffing. His tool bag thunked.

“Tavi,” she said. “You run like you borrowed your own legs.”

“I did,” he said. “Everyone keeps blaming ‘bad bolts.’ I tightened those bolts so hard my elbows squeaked.”

“Squeaked?”

“Not me. At night. Like… rubber shoes on glass.” He frowned at the nearest tower. “Then the cameras glitch for one minute. Always one minute.”

Ms Paintbrush Caribou lifted her giant glowing blue paintbrush and flicked a tiny blue swish onto a blank wall panel. It dried neat and flat.

She leaned close to the tower base and used xray vision.

A thin, fresh scratch line sat under the metal, too clean to be weather.

“Text me any sounds tonight,” she said.

Tavi swallowed.

From inside the tower, something made a soft, quick tap

Rubber-Shoe Sky

Tap-tap-tap.

Ms Paintbrush Caribou pressed her ear to the tower wall.

Tavi’s phone buzzed once, then showed one sad bar. “It’s doing the one-minute thing.”

“Then we move,” she said.

She swooped him off the roof, careful with his tool bag, and landed across the street by a bright laundromat. Warm air whooshed out each time the door opened. The sidewalk glittered with puddles.

Inside, a smart woman with short hair folded towels with sharp corners.

“Ma’am,” Tavi said, “do you hear squeaks at night?”

“I hear everything,” she said. “I’m Marla. Look.”

She pointed under the window ledge. A clear suction-cup gadget clung there, like a toy octopus without arms.

Marla flicked it. It squeaked like rubber shoes.

Ms Paintbrush Caribou held up her paintbrush. “Tavi, call the guard desk. Now.”

As he dialed, a heavy clank boomed outside.

Through the glass, one paintbrush tower began sliding down into the sky-socket